


Gwenvid Week 2018

by Forestwater



Category: Camp Camp (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Camper AU, Dadvid AU, F/M, Fluff, Gwenvid Week 2018, Halloween, Smut, canon-compliant mentions of death, ghoul au, not all of these apply to every chapter obv, nsfw focused heavily on roleplay and bondage, nsfw marked, post-season 3, you'll figure it out - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-25
Packaged: 2019-08-29 15:45:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16746859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Forestwater/pseuds/Forestwater
Summary: Yep. More of these goobers.Prompts:Day 1: 10 Years Earlier / Camper AUDay 2: Aliens / StarsDay 3: Heritage / ParentsDay 4: Spring / Autumn / WinterDay 5: Community Appreciation / Favorite AUDay 6: 10 Years Later / Camp ActivityDay 7: Free Space





	1. Day 1: Camper AU

**Author's Note:**

> Migrated from tumblr to Ao3! And unlike last year, I completed this one!!!

##  **~~10 Years Earlier~~  / Camper AU**

“ _Gwen!_ Where are you  _going?”_  David jogged to catch up with her, nearly tripping over his own feet, and snagged her elbow. “We’re supposed to be at the bonfire!”

She pulled her arm from his grip but let herself be tugged to a stop. “Who cares about a stupid bonfire right now, Davey? Jasper’s gone missing!”

David rolled his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest. “He’s not  _missing_ , silly. He just went home!” A shadow crossed his face and he dropped his gaze to the dirt, worrying his lower lip with his teeth. “For some reason.”

Gwen scoffed, turning her back to him and continuing toward the dock, where a couple boats were still tied up in preparation for tomorrow’s Kayaking Camp. “Yeah,  _some_  reason. And the reason is on that island.”

“No it isn’t!” he whined, glancing nervously over his shoulder as he followed her to the boats. “Gwennnn –”

“Hey.” She turned to face him, prodding his bony chest with one finger.  _“You_  guys went off without me.”

“Mr. Campbell needed us! And you were … under the wea –”

 _“You guys went off without me,”_  she repeated, narrowing her eyes, “and now Jasper’s gone. Maybe for the whole rest of the summer.” She twisted away from David quickly, swiping at her eyes before kneeling beside one of the ties holding the boat to the dock. “And I wanna know what happened.”

David made a quiet, frustrated noise, and Gwen didn’t even have to look up to know he was yanking at his hair. “Mr. Campbell  _said_  he was just –”

“You’d have to be a real  _doofus_  to believe anything Mr. Campbell says.”

He gasped, his eyes going huge. “You can’t say that!” he whined, and she wasn’t sure he meant the bad word or doubting the great Cameron Campbell.

Either way, Gwen didn’t have the patience for it. “I’ll say it again if you don’t stop bugging me, Davey!” Jasper had been the only person who understood how annoying camp could be, once Davey went all goody-two-shoes, and the rest of the summer just wouldn’t feel right without him.

She loved Davey, of course, but … they were a team. And she couldn’t leave a member of the team behind.

Finally having figured out the knots holding the boat, she sat down on the edge of the dock, swinging her legs over and preparing to lower herself into the kayak.

“Wait wait wait  _wait!”_ David caught her underneath the arms as she started to drop, dragging her backwards with way more strength than she thought he possessed. Stupid Weights Camp, and stupid Davey for actually participating in all the dumb camps now. “Please, Gwen, don’t go!”

She kicked fruitlessly, heels scraping the dock. “Listen –”

“No,  _you_  listen!” He dropped her onto her butt on the dirt, falling to his knees hard enough to make him wince and taking her hands. “Jasper and I had a fight, and then he went away. And now  _we’re_  having a fight, and I don’t want you to go away too!”

“My parents wouldn’t pick me up anyway, even if I wanted to leave,” she muttered, shifting to stand back up. But David clung to her, scrabbling forward on his knees as he tried to keep his grip.

“That doesn’t matter!” His breathing was coming faster, harsh and cracking with panic. “Just please please please don’t go, Gwen. It’s not a good idea!”

“You could come with me,” she offered, still trying fruitlessly to tug her wrists free, but he shook his head, eyes wide and horrified.

“No, no no nonono! It’s not safe there.”

She frowned. “Why wouldn’t it be safe? It’s just a regular island.”

He fell silent, lip trembling. He wouldn’t quite meet her eyes; his gaze darted from her chin to her forehead to the puff of her bangs without settling on any one place.

Gwen sighed, glancing over her shoulder at the kayak, which had started to float away. She could still grab the rope that tied it to the dock, though, and drag it back close enough for her to climb in.

Jasper was missing. And she didn’t care what cock-a-doodle excuse Mr. Campbell made up, something bad had happened. He wouldn’t just leave without telling them, no matter how much he hated the camp.

“You know this doesn’t add up,” she murmured, looking down at his shaking fingers wrapped white-knuckled around hers, “don’t you?”

“N-oo,” he said with a whimper, swallowing hard. “I just … don’t want you to leave too, Gwen. Please, don’t leave me.”

He finally looked up at her. His eyes were damp and sparkling.

It was infuriating. Gwen knew there was a mystery here, and she’d read enough  _Caleb Cleveland: Kid Cop_  books that summer to know the answer was waiting for her in the middle of the lake.

David’s grip tightened. “It’s just like Mr. Campbell said,” he breathed, not looking away from her face like he was trying to read reassurance from her features. “Jasper was tired of camp, so he went home.”

They were a team.

“I … think you’re right,” she finally said, wiggling her fingers until he let go of them and then standing up. “Come on, let’s go to the bonfire.”

For a moment he just stared at her outstretched arm, cheeks ashen and eyes huge. His brows furrowed, like he was trying to process what she’d just said. Then he took her hand and let her pull him to his feet, keeping his fingers laced with hers. “Yeah,” he said, a little dazed. Like he was waking up from a bad dream. “Just be- … because Jasper doesn’t want to be at camp anymore doesn’t mean we can’t still have fun, right Gwen?”

She resisted the urge to look behind her as they walked away from the lake. Back at the unmoored boat, and the black shadow of an island that loomed beyond it. “Right,” she agreed, a knot in her chest loosening at the happy little sigh of relief that David made, at the way his shoulders relaxed.

Maybe she’d slip away one night and sneak over to Regular Island. Find the answer to her questions once and for all.

Probably not, though. Not with the memory of David’s pale, stricken face still lingering in the back of her mind, not with  _“please don’t leave me”_  a faint echo in her ears.

He was her team.

Mystery or not, he was  _hers_.


	2. Day 2: Aliens/Stars

##  **Day 2: Aliens / Stars**

“Do you really believe in aliens?”

David shrugged, leaning back on his hands and tilting his head to look up at the stars. The campers had fallen asleep sprawled across the Activities Field, wrapped up in sleeping bags and ratty blankets they’d pulled down from the attic. “I’d  _like_  to,” he finally said. “There’s lots of things I’d like to believe in, even if they aren’t true.” He glanced over at her, his fringe falling down in front of his eyes and blocking out the starlight that had turned them silver. “What about you?”

“Could be. I don’t really think about it much anymore.” A breeze from the lake rustled through the grass around them, making her shiver; without a second thought, he stretched out one arm so that the blanket wrapped around him like a cape settled over her shoulders as well.

The movement squished her a bit closer to his side than she was usually comfortable with, but it didn’t really bother her right then. He was warm.

“When I was little I used to sneak out onto the roof of my parents’ house,” she admitted, “and shine a flashlight into the sky. I used to chase airplanes with it, just in case they were spaceships.” David made a soft sound in the back of his throat, one she thought was supposed to be a chuckle but came out a lot more like a squee. “Shut up, it wasn’t cute,” she said, nudging him with her shoulder and nearly knocking them both off-balance. “It was fucking dangerous.”

“You’re right! Please don’t tell the campers this story – they might get bad ideas.”

“Sure thing, chief.” Gwen rolled her eyes and let her head slump onto his shoulder. 

She was tired, sue her. And he didn’t seem to mind; aside from a barely-audible huff of surprise, David didn’t react beyond settling his arm more firmly across her shoulders, holding the ends of the blanket together with the other hand so no more stray breezes could drift into their cocoon.

“I wanted them to abduct me.” David jolted, probably surprised since she’d gone so long without talking. Gritting her teeth against the instinctive urge to stop “sharing her feelings,” she continued, “Mostly it was that, you know, bullshit like wanting to have a crazy adventure, or whatever. And I guess I wanted to run away from home. Don’t most kids?”

“I tried to join the circus,” he offered quietly, still looking up at the sky. “I made it two hours before I missed my mom. Never did find the circus.”

Fuck, that was cute. “You’re such a dork, oh my god. And also … well, I also sort of thought, if aliens were gonna go out of their way to abduct someone, they’d have to be pretty special, right?” Ugh, she was making herself cringe. But David hummed questioningly, encouragingly, so she said, “I was hoping … y’know, like maybe there was some super-advanced race of aliens out there that thought I was worth studying. Maybe adopting. Kids are stupid like that.”

He didn’t admonish her for insulting children, which was her first clue that she should’ve kept her dumbass mouth shut. And yep, there was her second, in the form of the gentle pitying way he said, “Gwen …”

“Anyway, if there are aliens I guess they didn’t want me,” she continued quickly. It wasn’t the best way to continue – still a little too whiny – but at least she’d managed to bite her tongue before tacking “either” onto the end of the sentence. “So I decided to pursue my dream of becoming an underpaid camp counselor instead. And here we are.” She finished with a dry flourish, knocking the blanket off her shoulders with a grand sweep of her arm that indicated the camp around them. “My success story.”

She supposed the aliens had made the right call, passing her over.

“It’s not such a bad place to be, is it?” David’s voice startled her. He wasn’t looking up at the stars anymore, but once her eyes met his they skipped away from her face, around the Activities Field and out over the lake. “I know it’s not exactly where you thought you’d end up, but …” He sighed, his shoulders slumping. “Yeah, I guess I can see what you mean.”

Gwen opened her mouth without having any idea what she was going to say – “eh, at least it’s not prison”? – when her eyes landed on something … well, three somethings. “Oh my god, get up get up come on.” She tugged David to his feet, ignoring his confused, stifled yelps as he got tangled up in the blanket, and as soon as he was mobile dragged him down the slope to the lake. They stopped about halfway down the hill. “Fucking look at that.”

The Problem Children were laying in the silvery grass a few feet below them, passed out in that dead-to-the-world sleep only little kids and David were capable of. Neil had his arms flung above his head, and Max had curled up in the space along Neil’s side, his head nuzzled into Neil’s ribs. Nikki was splayed out on her back on Max’s other side, snoring gently with one arm draped across both boys and the other over her eyes.

David let out the smallest squeak, covering his mouth with both hands. It was hard to tell in the light, but she was pretty sure his eyes were watering.

“They’re almost cute when they’re unconscious,” she teased, and he flapped one hand in her direction while digging through his pockets with the other.

“Where’s my gosh-darn phon — oh jeez.” He clapped a hand to his forehead with a sigh. “I think Max stole it.”

“It’s fine, I’ve got you.” Despite the fact that there was no force on earth that could make her admit she gave half a fuck about documenting the most obnoxious brats at camp snuggling (except for blackmail purposes, of course), she fumbled for her phone as fast and quietly as possible.

“Turn off the flash!” he hissed, eyes darting from the screen to the kids.

Gwen rolled her eyes. “ _Obviously_  I turned off the flash,” she snapped, flicking the little lightning bolt off as soon as he wasn’t looking. “Okay, that’s some adorable shit.”

“Ooh, Gwen, look!” David grabbed her wrist and dragged her up the hill while she was still admiring her photo, nearly knocking her on her face. “Get this too!” he whispered, bouncing back to her side and pointing at where Nerris, Preston, and Harrison had collapsed in a circle around a small patch of dirt littered with dice and playing cards.

While they crept around the field, getting pictures of all the kids – Gwen insisted it was proof that they could actually be still for thirty seconds, but she suspected at least a couple were going up on the Wall of Small Victories – David murmured, “For what it’s w –”

“ _Christ_ ,” she hissed, nearly dropping her phone, “don’t startle me like that, David!”

“Sorry!” He was quiet as they finished up returned to their spot, flopping onto his back (and dragging her down with him, since they were attached by blanket) and turning his attention to the stars.

She followed his gaze, trying to remember any of the constellations Space Kid would recite if anyone gave him half a chance. It all looked like a bunch of white dots to her, but maybe that splotch to the left was Orion’s Belt …

“I’m glad you didn’t get abducted by aliens, Gwen.”

She jumped, glancing over at him, but his face was still turned up to the sky, so serene and dreamy that she wasn’t even positive he’d actually spoken. She didn’t reply, because she didn’t want to look like a crazy person if he hadn’t said anything, and she didn’t want to break the moment if he had.

Because maybe it was the cold white light turning everything alien or the strangeness of being the only ones awake or just the fact that she was worn out, but something about this moment felt particularly breakable, fragile like spun sugar and surprising her with how … important, it seemed. Valuable.

“I know this isn’t exactly where you hoped you’d end up, but I – I want you here.” She glanced over, and he’d turned his head toward her just slightly, just enough for the light to catch on his cheekbones and cast otherworldly shadows across his face.

He was almost glowing.

Gwen dropped her gaze, because some things were too bright for humans to safely look at. “Yeah,” she said, shifting closer to his body heat. “Me too.”


	3. Day 3: Heritage

##  **Day 3: Heritage / ~~Parents~~**

“Gwen, this was a great idea!”

She rolled her eyes, glancing up from a book about … The Harlem Revolution? She’d gone through so many she’d lost track. “I think I’d have liked it better if you didn’t make us do it, too. It’s been four years since I’ve had to do homework, David. I didn’t miss it.”

“Well, the campers sure don’t seem to feel that way!” he said with an infuriatingly satisfied smile, gesturing to where the kids were lined up at computers in the small classroom they’d managed to talk the Sleepy Peak Public Library into loaning them. They were behaving remarkably well, considering the fact that they were little beasts hell-bent on causing mayhem and destruction.

“They’re just happy to have an internet connection again. Doesn’t matter what we make them do with it.” All the kids had immediately refused books instead of using the library computers, a decision that surprised only David. (Hell, Gwen had only followed him over to the nonfiction section out of pity. Pity, and because she really did love the way old books smelled.)

This field trip was in preparation for Heritage Day – a brand-new tradition Gwen had spent weeks convincing David was a better option than the Order of the Sparrow. She was half convinced he’d only agreed in the end because they could still wear costumes. Armed with a phone call to their families and six hours of Internet, the kids were supposed to be researching their backgrounds so that they could celebrate their diversity.

Or whatever.

Gwen just really didn’t want to dress as a dollar-store Native American again.

Speaking of … “Can you run a boob check?”

David sighed, pushing his chair back and standing with exaggerated disapproval. “Please don’t call it that.”

Giving the campers access to the internet meant rather strict supervision. For the most part it was a matter of making sure no one was playing games or attempting to hack into the CIA, Neil, but the most memorable by far was Max’s impressive ability to circumvent the library’s blocked websites to find what David was charitably calling “anatomy lessons.” Sure, pretty tame compared to what the dumb kid could stumble on without any sort of locks, but still, the counselors had to at least look like they had some measure of control over their kids. Which meant periodically walking around and keeping an eye out for suspicious code … or boobs.

“Max! Close that right now!” A few minutes later he returned with all the scandalized ruffledness of a Victorian schoolmarm. “I hate to admit you were right, Gwen –”

“Thanks.”

“– but we really need to monitor him more closely! He was watching something called a …” He lowered his voice, leaning in dramatically, “ _ninja sex party_. I don’t even know what that is!”

Gwen paused. “Was there a lot of candy? And some women who were definitely porn stars?”

“Well, I don’t want to make assumptions about their professions, but –”

“And like, what looked like the world’s weirdest furry convention?”

David was staring at her with a mixture of awe and horror. “I … don’t know what that means. But probably?”

She nodded, sitting back with a grin. “Don’t worry too much about it.”

He frowned, eyeing her suspiciously like she might suddenly explode into a riot of child-inappropriate behavior. “I don’t know. Not to be rude, but if it’s something  _you_ like …”

“Fuck you,” she said without malice. (He had a point, to be fair.)

“How’s your research going?” he asked, changing the subject with an ease and quickness that always gave her whiplash. He leaned over her book, cocking his head to the side and looking down at a picture of Billie Holiday. “She’s pretty.”

“If you ask me if we’re related I’m legally allowed to punch you.”

“I wasn’t!” he said, indignant. Slumping his shoulders and looking away, he pouted and muttered, “I  _learned_.”

Gwen would give him that; he’d been much more sensitive since they’d started dating, excepting the Morgan Freeman Incident. “What about you?” Despite having brought an armful of books over, he hadn’t done much more than vaguely leaf through them, too distracted by keeping an eye on the campers. (And, she got the sense, not really a reader. Except for her romance novels, which he still thought she hadn’t noticed him borrowing.) “What’re you made up of, anyway?”

He smiled, straightening up. “Well, of course I’m Canadian!”

“Unless you’re indigenous or a beaver, I feel like that’s bullshit.”

He just grinned at her, because apparently she couldn’t come up with a way to seriously piss him off. “I had to do a bit of research –”

“You mean call your mommy.”

“ _Yes_ , and it turns out it’s a little … all over.” He frowned down at the atlas he’d opened, tracing the country borders thoughtfully. “Apparently I have some Scottish –”

“Kilts. Nice.”

“– English –”

“Bad food, nice.”

“– quite a bit of French –”

Her smirk widened. “ _Very_  nice.”

“Will you  _stop?”_  he whined, but he couldn’t keep the corners of his mouth from twitching. He waited until she’d folded her hands on the table and given him her most wide-eyed, innocent, “I promise I’m done being a pain in the ass” expression before continuing, “But it seems like it’s mostly Irish. From both sides.”

She knew she’d promised she wasn’t going to keep annoying him, but … “Oh my god. You’re a leprechaun.”

“Gwen!”

“Come on, half at least. I’ve seen your mom, she’s  _tiny_. She could fit inside my pocket.”

David groaned, dropping his face in his hands. “This is not in the spirit of Heritage Day.”

“Don’t worry, CBFL,” she said, leaning over to stroke his hair, “I won’t let anyone steal your Lucky Charms.”

“I hope you’ll treat the campers’ heritage with more respect,” he said, tilting his head to glare at her; his outrage was dampened somewhat by the way he kept giggling.

She nodded, turning to make sure the kids were still all being relatively well-behaved over at the computers. “Of course. But then again, none of  _them_  asked me how Shakira can be blonde if she’s ‘Mexican.’”

“That was two years ago! I’ve grown up!”

“But not gotten any taller. Must be your leprechaun blood.”

He opened his mouth to retort, but they were interrupted by a shy-looking middle-aged woman with a thick cardigan and thicker glasses. “I’m going to need to ask you to keep it down,” she said apologetically, like she was the one who’d gotten in trouble. “I’m afraid you’re disturbing the other patrons.”

“Yeah, stop flirting,  _David,_ ” Max called over. Of course he wouldn’t miss them getting reprimanded. “We’re here to learn.”

Nikki’s head popped up over the computers as she leaned across Neil to see Max’s screen. “Whoa, I didn’t know metal could  _go_  in there!”

Gwen and David shared a split second look. “Boob check?” she asked, raising her eyebrows.

“I think that’d be a good idea.”


	4. Day 4: Autumn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one gets a little heated, but nothing teens and older shouldn't be able to handle. It's the precursor to day 7 though, which is nsfw . . . so tread carefully, even if this one is mostly fluff.

##  **Day 4: ~~Spring~~ / Autumn /  ~~Winter~~**

This was a lot of effort, Gwen thought, adjusting the skirt that refused to stay in place, to go to for three hours of sitting at home and  _maybe_ seeing some kids for a few seconds.

But David  _loved_ Halloween. And it was impossible to say no when he looked at her with those pleading, eager eyes. Besides, it was an excuse to waste money and time on looking good in a way she hadn’t had an excuse to since prom, which was why she was wearing the most ridiculously poofy, impractical, borderline uncomfortable –

There was a rapid banging on the bathroom door, making her jump and nearly impale herself in the eye with her mascara brush. “Gwen!  _Gwen!_ There are trick-or-treaters coming!” A few hurried footsteps away, and then back, accompanied by a second flurry of knocks. “Gwennnn! They’re at the end of the driveway!”

“Give me a fucking second, I’m coming,” she snapped, but she couldn’t help but grin at his enthusiasm. He’d gotten dressed the second he’d arrived home, sitting for over an hour in his poofy shirt and eyepatch (that had no business looking as good on him as they did) and jumping at every noise from outside.

Slipping into her shoes – which she swore upon buying that she’d  _totally_ wear again so it wasn’t a waste of money, but knew deep down that they’d just spend the rest of their lives in the back of her closet – she made her slightly-wobbly way to the front door, letting her gloved fingers trail along the wall as she adjusted to walking in such narrow heels. David was already there with a massive bowl of candy she’d insisted was way too much for how many people would actually stop by, kneeling to congratulate the children on their costumes.

“Don’t be so sure about that, Jason! I think I could hold my own in a ba –” The  _clack_ of her heels cut him off, and Gwen couldn’t help but preen a little bit as she took her place in the doorway next to him.

“Look at you guys!” The last kid finished digging through the bowl – they were taking all the Milky Ways; good thing she’d hoarded a stash in her bedside table – and the pack started to move on before one of the parents snagged the arm of the only girl (at least, Gwen thought it was a girl. She wasn’t great with kids, especially when they were too young to attend Camp Campbell).

“Who’s that, Ellen?” she cooed, pointing at Gwen, who realized she was going to serve as a teaching moment for a toddler. Which was fine; she’d done worse things. “We’ve seen her before! Who is she?”

The little girl didn’t reply, ducking her head and letting her maroon curls obscure her face, but the boy in the Jason mask pushed it up his head and shouted, “A princess!”

“Good job, Aaron,” the mom said tiredly, before turning her attention back to Ellen. “And do you know  _which_ princess that is?”

Both stared at Gwen blankly – she realized that none of them probably knew who Brandy was, and felt so old her joints ached – and so she coughed delicately and lifted her massive ice-blue skirts just enough to poke out a shoe that was translucent and mirrored, like the surface of a bubble. A little silver bedazzled butterfly sat on the toe, and fuck discomfort, she loved these damn things and would wear them everywhere.

“CINDERELLA!” Aaron said, throwing his arms in the air like he’d won a prize, the little girl’s quiet, lisping echo coming a beat later.

“Good job!” Honestly Gwen was a little relieved they didn’t guess Tiana. Her dress just had to  _also_ be blue … “I think that deserves more candy. Don’t you, Captain?”

David jumped, shoving the candy bowl toward the trick-or-treaters. “Oh! Y-yeah, of course. Here you go, kids!”

Ellen darted forward and grabbed a candy bar – another Milky Way, for fuck’s sake – but Aaron lingered, glancing between Gwen and David. “Why is Cinderella with a pirate?” he finally asked.

She bit back her immediate response ( _“why is Cinderella giving her favorite candy bars to a serial killer?”_ ) and smiled down at David, who didn’t seem to realize he was still kneeling. “Well, Captain Redbeard drove a hard bargain,” she said, rubbing his jaw affectionately and messing up the carefully-trimmed beard he’d spent weeks growing, “and he had candy.”

Aaron nodded sagely, glancing back at his parents. “I see. He kidnapped you.” He took a few steps back, eyeing the house next door with obvious longing. “Happy Halloween!”

Gwen closed the door and tugged the bowl out of David’s hands, pawing through it as she returned to the living room. “Okay, next year we make sure to only have stuff we don’t like in here – David?” She turned, suddenly realizing he wasn’t behind her. “What’re you doing?”

He’d managed to stand up, but was leaning against the arch that separated the two rooms. When she said his name again he jolted upright, rubbing the back of his hand across his mouth and chin like she’d caught him drooling in his sleep. “Ah! Yes?” he offered hopefully.

She smirked, crossing her arms over her chest. “Not a yes or no question, babe.”

He flinched, reaching up to run a hand through his hair before remembering his bandanna was wrapped around his head, holding his pouf back. “Sorry, I was just …” He swallowed, tugging at the sleeve of his shirt, twisting the cuff around his wrist. “That’s. A nice costume.”

“Yeah?” She turned her back to him, sticking out her foot and angling her ankle so that the surface caught the light. “These shoes are pretty cute, I gotta admit. Probably too expensive, but Halloween only happens once a –”

Her breath caught in her throat as his hands caught her hips, tugging her back against his chest before sliding up to cage her waist. For a few seconds he just traced the bodice of her dress, up until his thumbs brushed the top of her ribs and then down to where the tight fabric met clouds of chiffon and back again, before skating forward to flatten his palm on her stomach and press her more firmly against him. His hips stuttered forward, and his head, hanging next to hers, lowered to press a scratchy kiss to her neck. “Sorry, but you …”

Gwen fought the temptation to grind back against him, instead tilting her head back to rest on his shoulder. “Why, Captain,” she murmured, her breathless surprise only half teasing, “am I being ravished?”

The word earned her a strangled noise, like a groan only partially stifled. “N-nno,” he mumbled, but his fingers tightened on her hips painfully.

“Sure seems like it.” She turned to kiss his throat, smiling at the way he shivered. “It’s rude to grab a lady, you know,” she continued, fighting to keep her voice as close to Jane Austen as possible.

“Pirates aren’t polite.” David punctuated the statement with a nip at her ear, and she could practically feel how hard he was blushing. She could also hear the grin in his voice, sunny as usual, a little sheepish, but something in his voice was downright roguish.

So, roleplay. Apparently that was on the table. But he’d been way too excited about Halloween for her to let him ruin his own holiday. “Later,” she said, dropping the affectation and ducking out of his arms. “No one will ever trick-or-treat here again if they see us fucking in front of the living room window.”

He jumped, glancing outside — and oh, he’d been as flushed as she’d thought, cheeks almost as red as his beard; how fucking adorable — and straightening his costume. “Oh. Right! That’s — of course. Sorry, Gwen.”

She grinned and flopped onto the couch, slipping out of her already-painful shoes and reaching for the remote. “Pirates aren’t polite, are they?”

* * *

The eight PM curfew didn’t do much to keep the trick-or-treaters at bay, especially when it was barely dark out, so it wasn’t until around ten-thirty that night when David finally flicked the porch light off, leaving a bowl of candy out for any scavenging teens (or raccoons, as Gwen had suggested, but he’d waved her off). “Wasn’t that fun?” he asked, clasping his hands over his chest and beaming at her.

It had been. Her feet were killing her from being on them all night, but the pure delight on his face was well worth it. “That wasn’t bad,” she said, drawing the words out like it was a painful admission because none of the kids they’d had visit that night were quite as cute as the way his smile turned triumphant, and how he chewed on his lower lip to try and hide it. “More fun than when I was growing up, anyway.” Something flickered across his face, surprise tinged with pity, and she changed the subject before he could bring up what a failure of a childhood she’d had. “So now what?” She straightened her posture and widened her eyes. “It seems like I’m all alone with a dangerous criminal,” she breathed, feeling her face heat up as she tried not to laugh or stumble over her words. It’d been a long time since she’d done this kind of thing.

David’s eyebrows drew together in confusion, then shot up nearly to his hairline. He coughed and looked away, rocking back on his heels. “That – oh. Right! It’s just – well …”

“What’s up?”

He glanced over, briefly meeting her eyes before his gaze took a less-than-subtle appreciate sweep down, then studied the floor between their feet. “You look very – it’s not that! It’s not like I … there’s a tradition, is all?” He looked back up at her hopefully.

Whatever he wanted her to understand, she’d missed it. “Tradition?”

“Yes! Y-you see, there’s all this extra candy …” He scrambled into the kitchen, where she heard the rustling of bags, and then he returned with the three bags of candy she’d insisted they didn’t need and he’d sworn up and down they did. “And not everyone gets to enjoy Halloween, because they have to work. So my mom and I, when I was a kid – and, you know, also now, sometimes – we would fill up the candy bowl and … never mind. This is silly. I’ll just return these tomor –”

He started to back off toward the kitchen, but Gwen snagged his arm, her mind working overtime to try and translate the David-speak. “Do you usually deliver candy to people who have to work tonight? Like, dressed up and everything?”

“Yeah,” he mumbled, scratching the back of his neck with the hand not holding the candy. “It was a bit goofy, but when I was sixteen I had to work on Halloween and so my mom – it doesn’t matter.”

God, her feet were going to kill her. “Do we at least get to drive around to deliver the candy, or are you gonna make me trek all the way to Walmart? Because these aren’t hiking shoes.”

His gaze flicked up to hers, the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth almost obscured by his ridiculous beard. “Really? You want to?”

“I wouldn’t say want to, but if I was stuck working tonight I guess it’d be cool to have some weirdos bring me candy.” She leaned in to inspect the bags. “This is all pre-wrapped, right? So no one will assume we’re like, super inefficient serial killers or something?”

“Oh, Gwen!” Nearly dropping the bags on her feet, David threw his arms around her waist and hauled her into the air, spinning around in a half-circle – before tripping over the discarded candy and nearly sending them both toppling into the TV. “You’re the best!”

“Damn right I am,” she agreed with a sigh. “Put me down before you break something, Christ.”

“Of course!”


	5. Day 5: Community Appreciation / Favorite AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To celebrate the amazing Gwenvid community, I took the really fascinating Ghoul AU that [color-theorist](https://tmblr.co/mpGRohNXX3Ye-aDVLQK0GHQ) (or [color-theorist-art](https://tmblr.co/mJA2nXZVIJANzGfEaGUL7qQ)) created, which has no explicit Gwenvid as of yet, and then somehow accidentally created several pages of momgwen with very little Gwenvid in it. Oops. And probably fucked up the lore. Double oops. Oh well, I hope y’all have fun anyway! :)

##  **Day 5: Community Appreciation / ~~Favorite AU~~**

 

It wasn’t anything like  _Buffy_ , was the first thing Gwen realized about fighting monsters.

For one thing, it was a lot less fighting – she wasn’t exactly built for dealing out pain – and a lot more researching. And not in weathered tomes blanketed with a thick layer of dust with crinkled pages full of secrets. Sure, there was  _some_  of that, but ghouls in particular seemed to be a relatively new phenomenon, or were just so uninteresting to the ancients that they didn’t bother writing about them. Mostly it involved trawling internet forums and trying to arrange interviews with the leads who seemed the most promising. Which in itself required a great deal of convincing paranoid heroin addicts that she was neither a ghoul intent on devouring their flesh or a member of the government who would haul them off to Super Guantanamo. All that work, only to have her work dismissed by every publisher she’d recommended it to, and a pointed recommendation by the History Department chair that it would be best for her career at Sleepy Peak Community College if she found another subject to focus her studies on.

 _“‘It’s really all about the branding,_ ’” she mimicked quietly, shifting her weight in a futile attempt to get comfortable. ” _’Just call it “folklore.”_ ’ That’s academically dis-fucking-honest, Mr.  _Bishop_.” Gwen grabbed her bag from where it was dangling off the arm of a marble angel and hauled out a binder and a flashlight. “I’m the only professor under thirty who hasn’t gotten the fuck out of here after three months, Mr.  _Bishop_. This shitty school wouldn’t even have a goddamn newspaper if it wasn’t for me, Mr.  _Bishop_. Fuck, this is cold,” she muttered, glaring down at the polished granite with distaste before sliding down onto the grass, leaning back against the tombstone she’d just climbed off of. “I’m doing important work, here.”

Gwen opened the binder, eyeing the hand-drawn map of the Long Sleep Cemetery and tracing the scraggly line of bright red X’s that marked out fourteen ravaged graves, then flipping to a map of the entire city, which was covered in yellow dates around the church, hospital, and veterinary clinic. She glanced from these to the mausoleum she was staking out, like the ghoul would just appear there if she looked hard enough.

“Come on, asshole,” she said, flopping back against the tombstone and turning off the flashlight. “I know I did this right, so just show up where you’re supposed to.”

It was crazy, she knew all that. Knew her meticulous tracking of local robberies and vandalism looked from the outside like the scribblings of a madwoman fraying her last nerve. It was why she took so much care in repackaging every piece of evidence into a series of respectable, ponderous, academic –  _boring_ , if she was being perfectly honest with herself – books.

A series of respectable, academic,  _unpublished_  books.

Because this was all crazy. Believing in undead monsters that needed to consume the living (or recently-dead) was crazy. Objectively, she was probably rather crazy.

The thing was, she was  _right_.

She just had to find a way to prove it.

“You’re not good at this, are you?”

Gwen jumped at the voice and whipped around, brandishing her flashlight in one hand and her binder in the other – before she overbalanced and had to drop both, catching herself before she fell flat on her back in the dew-drenched grass. “ _Whaa_ therfucke –”

So. Not much like  _Buffy_  at all.

Her attacker was thin, stretched out and lanky like a very short Slenderman. As he stepped around the gravestone and moved towards her, his eyes reflected the light from a nearby streetlamp like a cat’s, gleaming out from underneath the dark hoodie that obscured most of his features.

_Human eyes don’t glow like that._

She snatched up her flashlight and flicked it back on; she tried not to shine it in his face, but he flinched away from it anyway, hunching his shoulders and shoving his hands into his sweatshirt pocket. The light revealed a narrow brown face that was sickly yellow underneath the eyes and nearly gray in the hollows of his cheekbones. “Kids aren’t supposed to be out after ten pm,” she said, narrowing her eyes. She took in the teenager’s slouchy grace, the way he walked as though every movement was both naturally easy and indescribably exhausting.

“No one’s supposed to be in the graveyard after it closes, but that didn’t stop you,” he replied, slumping against the marble angel and watching her with those unnerving catlike eyes.

She’d found her ghoul.

Gwen drew herself up, standing so she could look down at him. “I have permission,” she lied. “I’m conducting research on the series of grave-robbings in the last few wee –”

“My dad’s a cop with really shitty password protection. You don’t have permission for shit.” He wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his hoodie. “You’re one of those nuts who wants to hunt vampires.”

“Ghouls aren’t vampires,” she corrected before she could stop herself, the pedantic need to be right temporarily overpowering her common sense. “Blood is evidently not an essential component of their diet, and – you know what, this is a stupid conversation and I’m not having it.” She settled back against her tombstone and turned her gaze to the mausoleum her ghoul was  _supposed_  to be raiding instead of making snide comments about her profession. “Go get your dead person snack.”

The kid jolted, and she watched his look of horror out of the corner of her eye. “How the fuck –” He shook his head, a shock of floppy black hair escaping the hoodie and falling over one of his eyes. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

She pulled her binder back into her lap with a small grunt of effort. Christ, this thing was getting heavy. “Whoever’s been raiding the cemetery’s been really smart about it,” she said, refusing to look up at him. “Always hits it just as the attention is beginning to die down – pardon the pun – and always far enough from the others that the area is totally isolated. But they do it without making it look like a pattern.” She glanced up at him, a little gratified to see him leaning over her map curiously. So this was what validation felt like! “I’d been wondering how they knew when to sneak back in here, but … having a dad in the police force might do it, if the cop was dumb enough.” She turned to another section of her notes, an alphabetical list of everyone in the SPPD. “I knew I should’ve paid more attention to their families,” she mumbled, flipping through the officers. “Which of you is the idiot with an undead son?”

“Hey, fuck you!” he snapped, stepping away from the binder and back to the marble angel. “You can’t just go around calling people monsters because they’re wandering around a graveyard. Hell, that makes  _you_  sound just as much like one of those things as me.”

Gwen ticked off on her fingers without looking up from the police directory: “Alarmingly thin, glowing eyes, a bit of a nasty undead pallor – bet people are constantly asking if you’re sick –”

“Again, fuck you.”

“– and a tricky-but-predictable pattern of raiding cemeteries, morgues, and … have you been eating dead animals?” She glanced up at him then with a frown. “I didn’t know ghouls could do that.”

“They can’t,” he muttered, kicking at the grass, “but it was worth a shot.”

She couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pride. This was her first legitimate monster sighting! She wasn’t crazy! “It’s all circumstantial, of course. You never really know if you’ve got a ghoul or just someone with, like, lupus. But the cat-eye thing was a big tip off. Also, you know, hanging out in the cemetery when no one in their right minds would go anywhere near the place.” He looked at her for a long moment, and she cringed. “Yes,  _fine_ , I heard it.”

“So you’re like an expert in useless information no one gives a shit about, huh?”

She thought about getting offended, but he was kind of right. At least, a boatload of publishers would agree with him. “Yeah …”

He looked back over at the mausoleum thoughtfully, and she couldn’t help but be curious. “Does it taste good when it’s been dead for a while?” she asked. She was sorely tempted to grab her pencil and notebook, but that might scare the kid off. “I’ve read it’s not supposed to be as …”  _Nutritious_  just felt gross, in this context, so she let the sentence trail off.

He shrugged. “A little bland, but I kinda like it better. Got this weird kind of … cheesy aftertaste? Not like I’ve had cheese since I was a kid, but like that really smelly stuff rich people put on everything.”

“That’s pretty disgusting.” She couldn’t quite keep the note of appreciation out of her voice. (She’d always been a sucker for gory movies.) “So what’s with the change?”

“What’re you talking about?”

That was in her other binder. Gwen rustled through her backpack until she found the right one and opened it up to a spread of newspaper clippings. “All the killings. Two this week, three in the last two months. I haven’t put a map together yet –” and god, she already felt tired thinking about it, “– but they don’t seem to have any sort of pattern. I figure it can’t be you because, well, all my research suggests that if you were eating fresh kills you’d be a lot more …” She gestured vaguely at him. “Alive-looking.”

He bared his teeth, and if they were sharper-looking than normal she was almost positive that was just her imagination. “You don’t have a lot of friends, do you?”

She didn’t, but that was beside the point. “So do you know who’s doing this?” she asked, scrambling to her knees and finally giving in to the urge to grab her pen. “Can you tell me? I interned as a police sketch artist, so even if you just describe them I bet I could –”

“You expect me to narc?”

“They’re killing people!”

“Eh, I –”

_“Max?”_

They were both blinded; squinting past the flashlight, Gwen could barely make out a male figure. The newcomer lowered the light, stepping forward. His eyebrows drew together as he took in the scene: a kid lounging on a tombstone, having a conversation with a woman kneeling in the damp grass surrounded by open books and binders. “What are you doing out here? You know it’s past curfew!”

The ghoul – Max, it seemed – rolled his eyes and sighed. “It’s not like you’re gonna arrest me. I just saw this weird lady sneaking into the graveyard and wanted to see what she was doing.”

As surreptitiously as she could, Gwen glanced down at the list of police officers in her lap, comparing the smiling photos to the grim-faced man shaking his head at Max. Officer David E. Greenwood. On the force for about ten years. According to some gossip she’d scribbled in the margin, he’d turned down the opportunity to become a detective a few years ago, holding onto his lower-paying desk job for the sake of his –

His  _son_.

“Miss?” Greenwood waved the flashlight, dragging her attention back to the conversation. “I’m going to need to ask you to leave the –”

“Yeah, fine,” she grumbled, shoving her work back into her bag. “You know, I should get a special pass or something for doing research,” she said, more to herself than to the officer.

He cocked his head to the side, looking for all the world like a big puppy wearing a police badge. “Well, I’m afraid we can’t do anything like that, but I’d be very interested in learning what you’re researching!” He frowned. “Actually, you look familiar …”

“I used to be the department intern,” she said with a shrug. She was a little older than Greenwood, so it wasn’t like he’d have been working there to remember –

“Oh,  _Gwen!_  Yes, of course I’ve heard all about you!” He took a step forward, like he was about to wrap her up in a hug, before his smile dimmed a bit and he coughed lightly into his fist. “Mr. Campbell speaks very highly of you! He’s been saying he wishes more people would be willing to work for no money, but I’m sure he just meant that you did such a fantastic job! You work at the college now, right? You know, I’ve been meaning to take some classes but I just haven’t had the time –”

“Dad,” Max interrupted, “it’s cold as fuck. Can we just go?”

“Right! Sorry, Max.” He shot his son – though they really looked nothing alike – an apologetic grin before turning the smile toward her. “If you’ll just follow me, ma’am. Goodness, isn’t it lovely out here at night? Sometimes I wish …”

When they were outside, Max broke through Greenwood’s stream of pleasantries. “Hey, can I talk to her for a second before we go?” When they both shot him a confused, surprised look, he shoved his hands in his hoodie pocket, hunching his shoulders defensively. “What? We were in the middle of a conversation.”

Greenwood hummed thoughtfully, glancing between the two of them. “Well, I suppose there’s no harm. It was a pleasure to meet you, Miss Gwen.” He shook her hand enthusiastically.

“You too, officer.”

“Please, call me David!” He winked, then strolled along the outer cemetery wall until he was well out of earshot, his hands clasped behind his back like a military at-ease. Max scuffed his shoe along the asphalt; Gwen had dealt with enough students to know not to push him, so she watched the clouds slide like molasses along the sky and waited.

“You know a lot about this stuff, huh? Like, it’s useless, but you still have a lot of research.” She nodded, watching curiosity wage war with misanthropy across his face. Finally he blurted out, “So can I read some of it sometime? I mean, it’s probably mostly bullshit, but …”

She’d given up on carrying copies of her books around with her, on the off chance that someone might be interested if it came up in conversation. “I’m usually on campus at noon,” she said. “Stop by my office. I’ve got a couple things you could borrow.” She fought to keep the eagerness out of her voice, but the thought of her self-bound books actually being  _read_  by someone was way too exciting.

Even if that someone was a moody undead kid with the most improbable home life she’d ever heard of.

He nodded, a little awkwardly, and started to walk away before she put a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, are you gonna be all right without eating?”

He shrugged. “Isn’t the first time.”

Gwen hesitated. It could get so so fired, but … “Listen, I work some nights at the hospital morgue. Just like, processing bodies and stuff.”

“I thought you were a professor.”

She sighed. “Adjunct,” she admitted. “Only part time. Anyway, I can’t always … like obviously we’d have to be really careful, and there’s no real good way to … but if there’s actual murderous ghouls around you probably shouldn’t be so hungry they’ll kick your ass or something –”

“How did you make offering help come out so insulting?” Max sounded impressed. He glanced over his shoulder at David, then raised one shoulder in a half-shrug. “We’ll work something out, yeah. Beats digging up coffins all night.”

David meandered back in their direction. “Would you like to be walked home, Miss Gwen? It’s not safe to be out alone at this time of night.”

She couldn’t help but smile. “Yeah, sure.”

She knew how dangerous it was. Had written hundreds of pages on the subject, in fact.

But it was nice, for the first time in her life, to feel like she’d actually accomplished something useful.

* * *

“Dad wants you to come over for dinner again.”

Gwen jumped; Max had an infuriating tendency to just appear in doorways without a sound, usually when she was deep in concentration doing something else. She thought maybe he enjoyed scaring her. “I have class tonight,” she said, taking the book he held out, “but tell him thanks.”

Max slouched into the chair on the other side of her desk, watching her dig through her books for the next one in the series. Over the past few weeks he’d been going through her research, and while his habit of writing corrections or commentary in the margins – with pen, no less! – was unbelievably annoying, she was making more progress in two months than she had in years. “Second time this week,” he observed.

It took her a second to realize what he was saying. “Huh? Oh, yeah, I appreciate it. Seriously, make sure you thank him for me.” Dinners with Max and David were a little awkward, mostly because only David seemed to really want to be there, but it certainly beat microwave dinners in front of her computer.

“I think he likes you.”

She made a dismissive noise. “He likes everyone,” she said. In fact, she’d made it a personal goal to hear him say something unkind about somebody. It was unsuccessful so far, but she had faith. She handed him the next book, watching him turn it over in his hands appraisingly with something almost like nervousness. It was one thing to have someone read your life’s work – it was quite another when the person reading your work was also literally the subject of it.

“So you’re gonna stop by after class, right?”

“I – no?” Sure, sometimes Gwen did, if she’d forgotten to give Max something or if David’s texts had seemed especially plaintive; she got the sense that his life wasn’t as sunshine-and-rainbows as he tried to make it seem, and watching TV or sitting out on the porch after Max had disappeared into his room wasn’t much of a sacrifice. But it wasn’t a habit or anything. “Maybe I have shit to do.”

He snorted. “No you don’t.”

She didn’t, but she didn’t need to be reminded of the life she didn’t have by an obnoxious kid who  _literally_  had no life.

When she didn’t respond he stood up, tucking her book under his arm. “So I’ll tell Dad you’ll be by after class. And I’m gonna be at Neil’s tonight.”

She raised an eyebrow. “So?”

“Ugh, don’t make me say it. It’s fucking gross.”

Gwen watched Max lope out of her office, wondering if he was aware that he’d just told her his father was lonely. And that it worried him.

* * *

“For fuck’s sake, just go  _out_  already!”

Her pen jerked a scraggly line across the paper, jagged and uneven like the sudden spike in her heart rate. “Why can’t you  _knock_ , you shitty excuse for a Halloween monster?” she growled, shoving her notebook aside and glaring up at him.

He set her book on her desk with surprising gentleness for someone who reportedly didn’t care about anything. “First, Dad is so goddamn annoying, and if I have to hear him talk about how ‘ _sweet_  that Miss Gwen is, don’t you think so, Max?’ one more time I’m gonna eat him. Second, it’d probably be easier to sneak me food if you were dating, since it’d be less weird for me to hang out with my  _stepmom_.”

“I’m not going to ask David out so it’s easier for you to feed,” she said, bristling at “stepmom.”

“No, you’re gonna do it because you keep staring at him like a creep whenever you think he’s not looking. That’s third, by the way,” he continued, holding up three fingers. “The only thing more annoying than  _him_  being all moony and stupid is  _you_  being all moony and stupid.”

“That …”  _is not true_  was on the tip of her tongue, but somehow she just couldn’t bring herself to say it. The problem was, she’d gotten accustomed to spending more evenings a week at the Greenwoods’ house than her own, and had started to find it more comforting. Which didn’t mean that she was interested in David, of course, but she’d been … surprised, by him.

By his genuine interest in her, and his support of her research even though it clearly made him uneasy. (Which was fair; “hey I think those murders you’re investigating are undead monsters” was a pretty uncomfortable thing to talk about, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t willing to listen.)

By how he remembered stupid little things, like her favorite foods, and how even when he was thoughtless and absent-minded it never seemed to piss her off the way it should.

By his horrible sense of humor and his worse taste in TV shows. By how his eyelashes were longer than hers, and framed his eyes so prettily. By the freckles she could only see when they were sitting thigh-to-thigh on the couch, or when he pulled her in for a goodnight hug. By –

Well,  _fuck_.

“Everyone I know is a fucking idiot,” Max groaned, tugging her out of her heart-attack-inciting epiphany. He ran his hands through his hair – glossy and sleek because he’d eaten last night; everything about him was glowing and lively compared to usual, making him look almost human – and stood. “Don’t even bother getting me the next book. You can drop it off with Dad tonight.”

“But he didn’t invite me to dinn –” She cut herself off at the look of pure exasperation he gave her, one that implied he couldn’t even deign that with a response.

“Fucking idiots,” he muttered, slipping out of her office.

* * *

“Okay, I know I basically made this happen because you’re both too dumb to function, but I’m hating every second of this. I take it all back.”

David practically leapt out of Gwen’s chair, almost knocking her out of his lap and face-first into a concussion courtesy of the corner of her desk. “M-Max! What are you doing here?!”

She just sighed, adjusting her position so she wasn’t in danger of falling and brushing her hair out of her eyes. “He does this.”

“I’m a student, Dad. I  _belong_  here.” He held up the binder – Gwen’s most recent book in the making – with a sharp, sarcastic grin. He was looking a little gray and drawn, and she made a mental note to grab him some intestines or something that wouldn’t be missed at work that night. When he was looking sick like this, his inhumanness stood out in stark relief, like the crisp lines of his teeth that were too big and too pointy for his supposedly-human mouth.

“In high school! Why aren’t you in class?”

He shrugged. “Lunch break,” he said. Gwen and David exchanged a look, because neither of them knew if that was true. It’d been a while since either of them had been students, after all. Dropping the binder on Gwen’s desk, he retreated to the door like he was afraid to coming too close to them. “What’re  _you_  doing here, anyway?”

“Um … lunch break,” David replied weakly, his face flushing.

Gwen picked up a stress ball and lightly tossed it at Max’s head. “Get out of here, you little shit.”

“I hate you both. See you at dinner,” he said casually, ducking out of the office and letting the door bang shut behind him.

David sighed, shaking his head. “Do you think he looks sick, Gwen? I’m worried he’s coming down with something.”

She winced. “Probably a 24-hour bug. Bet he’ll be fine tomorrow,” she said, ducking her face into the crook of his neck and kissing behind his ear. Sometimes she couldn’t fathom how someone who knew about ghouls could miss the fact that his own son was one.

But then again, David wasn’t an academic, and he certainly wasn’t trained in this kind of thing. And he had a tendency to ignore red flags when it came to people he cared about.

It was one of the things she loved most about him.


	6. Day 6: Camp Activity

##  **Day 6: ~~10 Years Later~~  / Camp Activity**

David tapped his chin with his pencil, staring down at the blank clipboard thoughtfully and trying to remember what he was supposed to be doing. Gwen had sat him down with his binder, and she’d had an excellent idea — well, she  _always_  had excellent ideas…

_Focus, David! Camp Campbell depends on you! For….something!_

Maybe he would focus better with a granola bar. He was pretty sure Gwen had stashed some of the chocolate-covered ones in their cabin before the campers had descended on them. Another good idea…golly, she really was full of them, wasn’t she? He loved that about her — not that he loved  _her_ , obviously, because they were just coworkers and friends and that would be ridiculous, not to mention against the rules.

Then again, he was in charge of the camp, wasn’t he? Didn’t that mean he could make his  _own_  rules? Not that he’d make that rule, since he didn’t need to, since they were just –

“David!” The cabin door swung open and Gwen stomped inside, dragging Mr. Campbell by the sleeve.

“I was focusing!” He shot straight up, giving the Camp Campbell salute on reflex. Neither of them returned the gesture, but that was okay. Just one of his employees’ many darling quirks!

Oh. Oh, wow.

He had  _employees_  now.

He wasn’t sure if that was exciting or terrifying.

“David,” Gwen snapped, giving Mr. Campbell a look that could freeze lava, “could you remind our former terrible boss that he now works for  _us_ , and therefore can’t wander around being a completely selfish asshole who won’t pull his  _excessive_  weight?”

Mr. Campbell straightened his clothes, frowning. “I’ll have you know this is all muscle. And I don’t work for either of you! The Millers were very clear that I’m just doing  community service — for  _free_  —” he said with a shudder, “— just until I’ve paid off my debt to society. And how long can that be?”

Gwen crossed her arms over her chest. “Say, a decade for every life you’ve ruined? So probably a while.”

His face went pale and a little green at the thought. “That’s…significant. Anyway,” he continued with his usual bluster, the can-do bravado that had always made David admiring and jealous in equal parts, “while I’m here I only take orders from Davey!”

David sighed, returning to his chair. “Now Cameron,” he said, and if there was a tiny shiver of vindictive pleasure at talking down to the greatest outdoorsman (and disappointment) he’d ever known, he wasn’t going to admit it, “I told you that you need to listen to Gwen as if she was me. We’re CBFLs, after all!”

She gave him a small smile, one that glowed in his chest all the way down to his toes. They had each other’s backs. Always had, always would.

“Yes,  _Gwen!_  Not this…” Mr. Campbell frowned at Gwen, tugging on the end of his mustache. “I want to say ‘Molly’?”

“Oh for fuck’s —  _I’m_  Gwen!”

He raised his eyebrows disdainfully. “That sounds like something Molly would say.”

“Mr. — Cameron, that’s…” David pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to massage away the headache growing between his eyes. “Who do you think Gwen  _is?”_

“You know, that…green-haired woman. With the captivating…eyes. Or…hmm, maybe that short one with the pink in her hair who’s never doing any work?”

Gwen looked like she was going to attempt to punt Mr. Campbell into the lake, so he crossed the cabin and put a hand on her shoulder, waiting for the blaze in her eyes to cool before turning back to their old boss. “Candace was one of the mothers on Parents’ Day,” he explained. “And Ered is a camper. And a child.”

“Really?” Mr. Campbell made a face. “Damn government infecting us with hormones. No wonder she looks like her growth is stunted. Probably damaged her brain too.”

“She’s also the Millers’ daughter.”

“And what an angel she is!”

David sighed, turning back to Gwen. “So you’re going to listen to Gwen, Mr. — Cameron.  _This_  Gwen. Who’s in the room with us.”

“Yes, fine,” he muttered, “no need to beat me over the head with it.”

“You should see what  _I_  beat people over the head with when they piss me off,  _sir.”_

David sighed again. “Gwen, no hitting anyone with a guitar. Or anything else.”

Once he’d received begrudging agreements that his employees would be on their best behavior, he sent them off to do…whatever they were supposed to be doing. Oh dear, he should know that, shouldn’t he? What kind of boss was he if he didn’t know that?!

For that matter, what was  _he_  supposed to be doing?

“Hey, David?”

“I’m not panicking!” he blurted out, whirling around to see Gwen standing in the doorway. “I mean…what can I do for you? Um, buddy?”

Her eyebrows shot up, disappearing under her bangs. “Are you freaking out?”

“Of course not! Everything is going wonderfully! Don’t you think it’s going wonderfully? I’m almost pretty sure it’s going wonderfully!”

“Yeah, okay.” She walked over to him, letting the door slam shut behind her. She knelt down in front of his chair, taking his hands in hers. “Come on, breathe. Every time I squeeze.”

She squeezed his hands, slowly coaxing his breathing and his heart rate back to normal, almost before he’d even realized how high they were. Sometimes it was really nice, having an expert in psychology working at the camp. “Thank you, Gwen!” he said with a small, nervous laugh, fiddling with the hem of his bandana. “I guess I needed that.”

She just watched him for a moment, long enough that he started to feel uncomfortable, but then she seemed to dismiss whatever had been on her mind, standing up and perching on the edge of his desk. She nodded at the binder. “How’s the camp cull going?”

Oh!

Right.

 _That’s_  what he was supposed to be doing.

“It’s fine!” he said brightly, turning his attention back to the list of camps and trying to ignore Gwen’s eyes on him.

“You haven’t gotten rid of any of them, have you?”

“Well …”

David didn’t know how to explain it to her. She didn’t love camp the way he did; she hadn’t been trotting at Campbell’s side while he paced back and forth across the Mess Hall, scribbling camp ideas on their big rolling whiteboard. She hadn’t watched the possibilities grow like a crack on glass, branching and fracturing and growing and sometimes dying, and it was Davey’s job to scramble up onto Campbell’s rolling desk chair and erase the rejects, and there was no way to explain how thrilling it was to see Camp Campbell truly be  _born_ , so how could he expect her to understand why each crossed-off activity felt a little bit like chopping off a branch of the Sleepy Peak Pine?

But he tried, because Gwen had a way of making him try, of coaxing words out of him that he wasn’t always even aware were inside him, or that he was capable of. She reminded him of Max, in that way.

“But not every branch is healthy, is it?” she said when he finally stopped. “Some of them should be cut off.” She’d crossed over to her side of the cabin while he was talking, and now she snagged a box of tissues off her desk and tossed it to him.

He … hadn’t realized he was crying.

Gwen rolled onto her stomach, taking her boots off so she could kick lazily at the air. “I’m not trying to be mean,” she said with surprising gentleness.

David laughed, a little damp as he wiped off his face. “I know. When you want to be mean it’s … hard to mistake for anything else.”

She snorted, flipping him off before her expression became serious again. “David, it’s just that this isn’t Mr. Campbell’s camp anymore. I know you want to keep the name – and even though I think that’s kind of stupid, I  _do_  get it.”

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes, because they’d had spirited discussions on the name of the new camp several times. The phrase “delusional hero’s complex” had come up more than once.

“But starting now, every camp on that list is going to unofficially have ‘David Greenwood’ attached to it. And not only should we limit it to things we can actually afford to do safely –”

As she spoke, David sighed and crossed “alligator wrestling” and anything with “sword” in it off the list.

“– but I don’t know how happy you’d be if someone actually showed up to camp expecting you to do some of these things.”

He frowned. “Like what? And don’t say ‘guess your weight’ camp, because that’s a valuable skill for a number of circus-related professions.”

“Like ‘pray the gay away’ camp,” she replied softly.

“Oh.” He flinched, glancing down at the list again. He traced over the words, worrying his bottom lip. “We haven’t really … had anyone for that camp in a while.”

“And what’d you do last time?”

David had only been seventeen at the time, and coming to terms with a bunch of things, so … “I think I handed it off to Quartermaster, for the most part. Not sure what they did, but after a few weeks that camper switched to underwater basket weaving. I don’t think I checked to see if he got permission from his parents, because … well.”

They were both quiet for a few moments, David looking down at the list and Gwen watching him. Finally he sighed and crossed it off. “What about the other one?”

“‘Pray the straight away’? I mean, it’s hilarious, but can we even do that? Like, I don’t know the legality of it if we don’t have some sort of, I dunno, minister or something.”

“Actually …”

She sat up. “You’re fucking kidding me. You are  _not.”_

“Mr. Campbell asked! He said he needed someone to perform a ‘discreet’ wedding for some of his friends. Something about a green card …”

Gwen shook her head, laughing. “How much illegal shit have you done?”

“It wasn’t illegal! I just went online and – the ceremony was actually  _beautiful_ ,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. “I’ll have you know I cried.”

“Of course you did.”

“Still …” He crossed it off the list anyway. “Camp Campbell is officially non-denominational. I think. Is that what that word means?”

She climbed off the bed and went to stand over his shoulder, looking down at the list. Once they got rid of everything that was legally or morally questionable … “God, that’s a short list.”

David nodded. That’d been what he was thinking, too. “But Camp Campbell is supposed to have something for everyone! There’s barely anything on here!” He’d already have to tell Mrs. Nurfington that they no longer offered Boot Camp. What were they supposed to do with so few activities?

“Hey, breathe.” Her hands alighted on his shoulders, making him jump but then almost immediately calming him. (His mind immediately went to one of Nerris’s spell cards, “Healing Touch,” and with it a warm rush of affection tinged with panic. Goodness, would he be able to provide these kids with the camp experience they all deserved?) “You have room for a lot of new activities now.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “That’s exciting!” Also scary, and a lot of pressure to suddenly throw upon his shoulders, but that was the name of the game now that he was in charge. It was an activity unto itself.

“So, boss,” she said, picking up the binder and pencil, “what have you always wished the camp would do?”

It took him a few seconds to think of an answer. “You know, I’ve always wanted to run a real bird-watching camp … oh, and football is a hard sport to play with so few campers, so I wonder if we could do a few more one-on-one kinds of sports. I think Nurf really enjoyed kickboxi –  _oh!_  What about animal handling? I know Quartermaster still has all those kittens from Cat Training Camp, unless he sold them like the last litter …”

Gwen shot down a few of his ideas and offered some of her own – and while David wasn’t  _thrilled_  about it, he did think a lot of the kids would really enjoy Video Games Camp – and by dinner they had a list of activities even longer than the ones Mr. Campbell had created, and his heart was lighter than it had been since he’d acquired the camp.

“Wow, these are amazing! But now we need to make brochures for them. And a new video! And maybe even a website – I bet Neil could help with that. And –”

“While we’re at it, David,” she interrupted, flipping through the brochures they’d had since Davey was a camper, “we should probably go through the camps we are keeping the same and edit these brochures so they’re a little less … you know, full of lies and legally fucked?”

Right, that made sense. Maybe they shouldn’t even have brochures for individual camps at all; maybe that sent the wrong message. Neil certainly had been disappointed by Science Camp “and more,” after all … so maybe they’d have to start from scratch. Again. “Oh, dear.”

“Nope, don’t freak out on me.” Gwen stood and put her hands on his shoulders again, steering him toward the door. “That’s a shitshow for Tomorrow David and Gwen. Right now, our only responsibility is pudding.”

“We can’t have dessert before dinner,” he said, letting her lead him to the Mess Hall. “That’s against the rules!”

She grinned – and the sight was rare, but getting more common every day. He didn’t think he would get tired of it any time soon, though. “Do you own this place or not, Mr. Greenwood? You make the rules now.”

He did.

And tonight, they’d certainly earned pudding.


	7. Day 7: Free Space (NSFW)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: Roleplayed dubious consent, lots of smut involving things like ropes and spanking, some fluffiness. Continuation of Day 4's Halloween costumes chapter.

##  **Day 7: Free Space (NSFW)**

****“God,” Gwen whined, collapsing onto their bed. “Your mom never wore heels to do this, did she?”

“I don’t remember,” David called from the other room – he was putting the candy bowl away, like some kind of  _grownup_  – “but I could’ve carried you?”

Her dress probably weighed more than he did; she was pretty sure the attempt would’ve killed him. “It’s fine, price of beauty and all that,” she grumbled, wriggling up the mattress to try and get more comfortable. “If I got blood in these shoes I’m gonna be so pissed, though.”

“Blood?!” He was at her side in an instant, his expression somewhere between concerned and annoyed. “Why would you –  _Gwen!”_

She rolled her eyes. “You don’t know a goddamn thing about women, do you?”

“That’s … some sort of -ist,” David said, disappearing into the bathroom. “Or -istic. I’m pretty sure it’s something like that.”

“Well aren’t  _you_  woke, Chief Squatting Bear.” He returned from the bathroom with an armful of supplies, kneeling at the foot of the bed with a long-suffering sigh.

“That was a long time ago!”

Gwen snorted. “Three whole years. You were so young and innocent.” She fell silent as he lifted one of her feet, sliding the shoe off gingerly. “Hey, uh, you don’t have to do that. I can just –” She started to sit up, but he waved her back.

“Princesses don’t wash their own feet,” he said, using a damp washcloth to clean her off. He was careful not to get any blood on the dress, which she found strangely touching. “Goodness, Gwen, didn’t this hurt?”

She shrugged. “I mean, yeah. But we were having fun, so …”

“Fun is not a good reason to hurt yourself,” he admonished. “This is going to sting.”

He was right, but she kept the whining to a minimum, partly because she wasn’t in the mood for a lecture about the importance of disinfectant and partly because she knew it really was her fault, and she shouldn’t have bought the damn shoes when she knew in the store that they’d make her want to chop her feet off. “They were cute, though,” she muttered at the ceiling, sucking a breath through her teeth as he continued doctoring up her feet.

“They are cute,” he agreed. “That’s why I’m glad we bought these band-aids!”

She sat up on her elbows and watched as he applied pastel-colored bandages to her blisters. “Are those Disney-princess-themed?”

“They sure are!” David sat back on his heels when finished, beaming at the … christ, seven band-aids across both feet. “I gave you one of each,” he said, pointing delicately to each princess, “and Cinderella twice, because  _you’re_  Cinderella!”

“You really missed your calling. You should’ve been a children’s show host. Like Mr. Rogers in hiking boots.” She’d meant to tease him, but he ducked his head and smiled proudly, gathering up his nurse gear and disappearing back into the bathroom. Once he was gone, she sat up, reaching for the shoes, letting out a quiet hiss of pain as she forced herself back into them.

“Gwen!” She suddenly found herself lifted up under the arms, David using one of his feet to gently nudge the shoes off of hers. “What are you doing?”

She resisted the urge to laugh, letting him lower her to the floor but capturing his hands in hers before he could pull away. She wound them around her waist and leaned back against him. “I thought the heels were … kinda a thing. For you. And besides, what’s the point of Cinderella without the damn shoes?” Before he could say anything, she realized how insane she sounded, propositioning him after he’d spent the last five minutes with her very unsexy blistered feet in his face. “I mean, fuck, you’re probably tired and my feet were all gross and you wanna just go to bed and definitely not …” She wriggled free, bending down to pick up the shoes and feeling her eyes prick, irrationally, with tears. “Sorry, that was fucking dumb of me to, like, assume –”

David’s fingers trailing down her spine shut her up, her skin prickling as his nail caught on the corset-like ties of the dress. “Do you want to go to bed?” he asked, running the backs of his knuckles along the waistline. “You’re hurt.”

“It’s not that bad,” she said, feeling her face warm as she snagged the shoes and stood back up. Idiot, stupid idiot with stupid feet … “But I mean, if I, like, totally killed the mood –”

“You didn’t!” His fingers closed around her wrist, searing warm through the cheap imitation-silk of her glove. “I mean, not to … pressure you or anything, but you look — and if you still — I haven’t been able to stop thinking —” He dropped her hand and stepped away, scratching at his beard awkwardly. “But if your feet hurt too bad, that’s fine too!”

Gwen let out a quiet huff of amusement. Three years later and they still hadn’t quite figured out how seduction worked. Sometimes she was amazed they’d even gotten together at all. “What a courteous knave you are, Captain Redbeard,” she said, any sense of self-consciousness melting at the way his eyes widened, gaze dropping to her mouth before flicking back up almost guiltily, “but I hardly have much of a choice as your prisoner, do I?” She stepped closer, biting the inside of her lip to keep it from twitching up into a smirk when he swallowed hard. (It was a movement she wasn’t used to seeing, but with his bandana in his hair and his shirt cut wide and low across his collarbones, she had unfairly tempting access to his neck.) “You can do whatever you want to me,” she added, tilting her chin up and letting her eyes slip half-shut.

David’s mouth crashed into hers gracelessly, one hand cupping the back of her neck and dragging her closer while he fumbled at her waist to get a grip on the slippery fabric. It was a rough kiss, scratchy and chocolate-flavored and tremulously eager; she shifted her weight, resting her fingertips on his chest and leaning into him until their bodies slotted together, and realized with a jolt that he was already half hard. The fact that she didn’t know whether it was from her words, or the novelty of role-playing, or if he’d been on a hair-trigger ever since he saw her costume, sent a shiver through her.

Rocking back on her bandaged heels, she shoved David away with one hand and slapped him hard across the face with the other. “How dare you?” she demanded, drawing up to full height (which was still a little shorter than David in his pirate boots). “I’m not some kind of … of … !”

The fact that she couldn’t come up with the right word didn’t seem to register. He was staring at her, fingers pressed against his reddening cheek, mouth slightly agape. Gwen faltered slightly; she’d hit him before, long before they’d started dating – and a handful of times after, when he’d asked her to – but it wasn’t a regular thing. She opened her mouth to ask if they were okay, and he surprised her by striding forward and grabbing her wrists in one hand, tugging her close and wrapping his other arm around her waist.

“That wasn’t very nice,” he murmured, and okay, it sounded less like an angry pirate king and more like his Disappointed Camp Counselor voice, but his grip around her wrists was just shy of uncomfortably tight and his every exhale was warm prickling down the side of her neck – and she was close enough to tell that her slap had absolutely had the intended effect.

For a moment they just stood there, both breathing hard, aware of the way their blood pounded where they touched, the fluttering hummingbird pulse in her wrists against his fingers and the insistent heat pressed hard against her hip. Then he leaned back, tilting his head to press a kiss to her cheek, and she honestly wasn’t sure how much of that was in-character and how much of it was just purely, essentially David. “I think I know what to do with you,” he said, sounding almost chipper, like he was going to suggest a new fun camp activity.

“Oh?” She ducked her head so he wouldn’t see her smile, turning the wobble of laughter in her voice into something resembling fear. “Pray, um – pray tell … what are you going to do to me?”

With her eyes lowered she couldn’t see his face, but she watched his shoulders shake with a soft chuckle, and she wasn’t sure if he was laughing at her or just improvising very well. Either way, her cheeks flushed and her heart rate picked up. “Please turn around,” he said, releasing her wrists so she could settle back against his chest.

“Very polite,” she murmured, settling into position with a content sigh.

He squeezed her hips affectionately before tracing up her sides, the touch just shy of ticklish through the thick, stiff fabric. “More flies with honey!” he chirped, and there was no pirate on earth who’d say that in such a sweet, bright voice, but Gwen had long ago realized that removing the sunshine from David was impossible.

She loved that about him.

His fingers skated along the neckline of her dress, then he pulled her closer with one hand and let the other slip inside her bodice. (Gwen had been bitterly frustrated by the way the dress was too big in the bust, but she found herself suddenly appreciating the extra room as he rolled her nipple between his index and middle fingers.) She let out a sharp gasp, turning her face into his neck just because she needed to absorb more of him, of his smell and warmth and the way his throat thrummed rapidly against her mouth with his heartbeat. “Ahh –”

David let out a pleased hum, continuing to toy with her chest until she was fidgeting, rubbing her thighs together in search of friction that wasn’t there.

“Please,” she finally gasped, reaching past her skirts to grab at the loose wool of his trousers, not so much to get his attention as for something to hold onto.

“I thought you were a lady,” he teased, slipping his hand out of her dress and kissing behind her ear, “too good for the likes of me.”

Okay, that had definitely come out of one of the romance novels sitting on the living room table, but goddamn if it didn’t take on a whole new life coming from her boyfriend’s mouth. Reaching for scattered shreds of coherence, she managed, “You haven’t won yet, rogue.”

He twitched against her hip, fingers accidentally digging into her sides enough to hurt. “Give me time.” He stepped back, catching her elbow as she overbalanced, and gestured gallantly to the bed. “If you would? Hands and knees, please.”

Someday Gwen would convince David to stop tacking “please” onto every order, but he looked so happy with himself, she didn’t want to risk making him self-conscious. She climbed onto the bed without a word, watching with anticipation as he strolled over to the bedside table. He knelt down, tugging open the bottom drawer and sifting through the contents slowly — slowly enough, she realized, noticing him bite his lip to keep from smirking, that it was absolutely intentional.

Finally he stood, winding a long black strip of silk around his fingers before sitting down on the bed at her side. “Please put your hands together,” he said. She didn’t move, glaring at him and lifting her chin. He waited patiently for a few seconds, and when it became clear she wasn’t going to do it, he easily snagged her wrists and pulled them together, looping the fabric around and tying the other end to the headboard. “How’s that?”

Gwen tugged, but David had always been extremely good at tying knots. “You have me trapped,” she said, her voice wavering. Usually she hated her tendency to choke up when she surrendered even the least bit of control, but this time it wasn’t embarrassing: she sounded so pathetic, so needy and terrified, and it sent a shiver down her spine.

David laughed, like the thought hadn’t occurred to him. “I suppose I do!” He brushed her hair back (after a long evening, wisps were beginning to escape her updo) tenderly and then moved to stand behind her. She jumped as his fingers closed around one of her ankles, and she felt another silk rope; he gingerly moved her leg until he could bind it to the foot of the bed, doing the same to the other. The position spread her legs further apart than she was expecting, and even under the clouds of fabric she felt weirdly exposed. As though reading her mind, David rested his hand on her ass, tracing the curve down her thigh until he reached her calf. He pushed back her skirt just enough to run his fingers ticklish-light over her skin, sighing almost dreamily. “You’re beautiful,” he said, and it tugged at her heart to know he had to break character just to make sure she knew that.

It gave her enough confidence to drag her back into the game. “I didn’t get dressed up for  _you_ ,” she lied, kicking the leg under his hand as well as she could with the little bit of slack he’d given her.

“Looks like it to me!” he replied cheerily, sliding his hands up her legs until her skirts were bunched up around her hips. “After all –” he pressed a scratchy kiss to one of the dimples at the base of her spine, “there’s nobody else here.”

Gwen swallowed, her stomach twisting warmly. “So I can scream all I want and nobody will hear me.” It was the kind of line he could never bring himself to say directly, but she could read between the lines.

He frowned, cocking his head to the side. “Are you going to scream?”

“Are you going to make me?” 

That was a little too sassy for Cinderella, maybe, but it slipped out before she could stop herself. David sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth, his palms skidding across her thighs as his soft, sure touches stuttered. Gwen lowered her head into her bound arms to hide a smirk. He’d always liked a bratty sub.

She waited a few moments, but he seemed lost, his hands on her hips and his thumbs tracing the edge of her underwear. She, shit, what was the posh way to say this… “What are you planning?”

“I…”

Fuck, he sounded nervous. Sitting up on her hands, she tried to crane her neck to see his expression. “David? Everything okay?”

His hands stilled, like she was going to scold him for touching. “Yes!” he squeaked.

That wasn’t all that reassuring. “Do you not know what to do or…?”

“I…have an idea.” His voice was uncharacteristically small, wavering slightly on the last word. “But I don’t know if you’ll like it. And I didn’t know how to — as the, um, pirate…”

A rush of affection filled her chest, mixed with fond exasperation. “Is it something we’ve done before?”

“I- infrequently.”

She could hear the wince in his voice, the way he wilted slightly, and wished she could take his hand, or at least look at him properly. “Is it something I said I’d do again?”

“Yes. Sometimes.”

Huh. Interesting. But David was hardly Spooky Island levels of depraved, so how weird could it be? “Let’s give it a shot, okay?” she said, wondering if he was about to jam his thumb in her ass or something. “I know the safewords.”

“Okay!” He was quiet for another second or two, just long enough for Gwen to start worrying he’d lost his nerve —

She jolted forward with a yelp, fingers twisting in the sheets beneath her as his palm connected with her ass, the sting not as intense as the satisfying smack that nearly knocked her on her face. She jerked at the restraints around her wrists. “What the –”  _fuck, shit, hell, no – something more princess-y,_  something that would let David know she wasn’t really mad at him, “–  _devil_  was that for?”

“You hit me first,” he replied, a little nervous quaver in the beginning of the sentence but was successfully quashed by the end. “Just being fair.”

“You son of a … a —”

Another spank, harder than the first; she gritted her teeth even as her clit throbbed. She knew his hand hadn’t left an imprint on her skin, but the tingling red heat radiating from the point of contact made it hard to get the image out of her head. “That was for the language.”

There was a note of confidence in his voice, a teasing smugness that made her shiver and momentarily blank on a response. Fumbling for a foothold, she said, “I didn’t say anything!”

“You were thinking it.” The mattress dipped down by her feet, and before she could wonder about the sudden weight he was on top of her, hands braced next to her elbows and his chest pressed to her back. His head hung next to hers, his breath tickling the wisps of hair that had fallen out of her bun. “Not very ladylike, my princess.”

With their position, his next spank was barely more than a pat; he traced the line of her underwear before dipping beneath it, drawing scratches along the curve of one cheek. It tickled as much as it hurt, but she squirmed with a showy gasp anyway — in no small part for the excuse to “accidentally” grind back onto him.

“What —“ she began, but he rolled his hips forward with a ragged sigh, pressing his forehead to her shoulder.

“Because I wanted to,” he panted, rocking against her once more before sitting back up. She instantly missed the warmth and pressure of his body on hers, rough from his cheap shirt and his unshaven face and the calluses on his fingers, but her character wasn’t supposed to beg (and it didn’t come naturally to her anyway), so she lowered her head, resting it on her forearms and savoring the shivery feeling of his hands running the woven lines of her thong. “Are these expensive?” he asked suddenly, plucking at the elastic of her waistband. “Or…out of stock, or something?”

Gwen tensed out of surprise. “No,” she said.

“They aren’t…special to you?” he pressed. “Hard to find, or — or sentimental …”

She fought the urge to snort; talk about unladylike. “No, I don’t have any feelings attached to this underwear.”

“Oh! Good.” There was a moment of silence, then the slight tilt of his weight leaving the mattress. She could just see out of the corner of her eye the bedside table where they kept their toys, and her cunt tightened in fluttery expectation of whatever he was hunting around for. There was a glint of something shiny, and then he was walking around the bed again, trailing his fingers down her spine as he made his way back over to her feet. “Hold very, very still,” he warned, and she felt something cool and smooth just barely graze her skin.

 _Snip_. Her underwear fell away from her heated skin, and he moved his scissors — blunt, mostly for emergencies when untying would take too long (and for when they were feeling especially kinky but not brave enough for knives) — to the other side. “Much better!” he said, tugging the scraps of fabric away and running his thumb down her now-exposed slit. “I was worried I’d have to untie you, but this just shows it’s always good to be prepared for anything!”

After this was over she’d have to tease him about sounding more like a Boy Scout than a criminal. “Do your worst,  _villain_ ,” she snarled, her toes curling with the effort it took not to push back on the tantalizingly light brush of his thumb.

“Don’t worry.” He chuckled, darker than she was used to hearing from her David. He parted her, gently dragging his nails down either side of her inner folds. “I’ll certainly try.”

He pushed one finger into her, moving slowly enough that she could feel him testing to see how ready she was. She bit down on her lower lip but couldn’t quite strangle the groan that rumbled in her chest. As though rewarding her for the noise, he slid in a second one, twisting his wrist to drag the pads of his fingers over her g-spot and sparking fire down to her toes. “Oh,” she breathed, needing to vocalize  _something_  and figuring that wouldn’t break character too badly.

She was being ravished, after all, and by now he happened to be very good at that particular activity.

David let out a sigh, shaky and ragged even as his fingers kept up their steady movement. She desperately wanted to see his face. “Wowzers, Gwen.”

“Princess,” she reminded him, in a tone that would’ve sounded more imperious if her voice hadn’t cracked from the tension it required not to rock back on his hand.

“R-right. Princess.”

He slid his fingers out of her, and the “ _pleasedon’tstop_ ” that tumbled from her mouth was entirely an accident.

He laughed, not a malicious or even teasing sound, but genuine happiness. “What?”

Gwen’s face burned with embarrassment; even if she hadn’t been playing a character, she tried not to sound quite so desperate. “That was…not what it sounded like.”

“Hmm.” And there it was — the smug, competitive edge to his voice.

“I meant, like, ‘ _please don’t. Stop_.’ Two separate sentences.”

“Did you,” he murmured, and the bed shifted, accompanied by the rustling of clothes. “So you’d be just fine if I left you here for a little while?”

She craned her neck to see him as he returned to the toy drawer. He’d untucked his shirt and removed his belt, but that was all. “You wouldn’t,” she said, not positive what was part of the role play and what wasn’t.

“That’s not the question, princess.” His voice was chipper, but as he came around to the front of the bed so she could see him, the smile on his face wavered slightly at the sight of her. He bit down on his lower lip, then licked it, his eyes going glazed for a second before snapping back to hers. “I want to know how you’d feel if I went into the bathroom with this?” He lightly tapped her cheek with the fleshlight he’d taken out of the drawer; she’d been so focused on his face that she’d barely noticed him holding anything,

Oh, it was hard to pay attention to their impromptu script when the mental image he’d conjured up made her stomach swoop and tighten. He’d kept the cool plastic of the toy’s handle just touching her face; if she turned her head, she could kiss the soft silicon cunt. (Well, no she couldn’t. He hadn’t uncapped the fleshlight — knowing he wouldn’t be using it, of course. But the thought still made her flush.)

“Gwen?” David knelt down, gently lifting her chin to meet his eyes. “Are you okay?”

She nodded as well as she could with her face in his hands. “Yeah, just…”

“It was too much, wasn’t it? I was — I was trying to, um, you borrowed my phone once and there was this…this story on it when you gave it back, and I wasn’t trying to snoop, I swear, but it was a lot like this and so I — I’m trying to remember how it went but I think I went too far and —“

She resisted the urge to laugh. No one could backpedal quite like David. “No, seriously, it’s fine. I’m just…having trouble. Staying in character.”

“That’s okay!” His thumb brushed over her cheek, back and forth in a soothing rhythm. “Should we stop?”

“No, it’s really, like, stupidly hot, but I…” It was hard to avoid his gaze in this position, but she was embarrassed enough to close her eyes. “I wanted to kiss you. But…the, y’know, Cinderella wouldn’t.”

“Oh!” he said, like he’d just solved an extremely difficult riddle. “Then we’ll take a kissing break!”

She was about to ask him what he was talking about when his grip tightened just slightly on her jaw, holding her still as his lips met hers. Aside from the roughness of his face, it was like a thousand kisses they’d had before — sweet and gentle and thrumming with an undercurrent of sexual tension that she could feel in her pulse and in the way his fingers shook. She let out a muffled sound as his tongue slipped into her mouth, and he pressed forward with a contented hum that unraveled something deep inside her belly.

“Okay, okay,” she mumbled, pulling away from him. “Time in. You’re —“ she took an unsteady breath, resettling herself on her elbows, “killing me, so…time in.”

“Are you sure?” And it was a testament to how cocky he’d gotten that she wasn’t sure if he was seriously asking or just saying “yes, and.” “Because I can always just —“

Fucking smug-ass pirate. “I…I would still be tied up,” she interrupted, fumbling for some shred of dignity. “So it’d be best to get this over with, wouldn’t it?”

David’s eyebrow twitched, the barest shadow of amusement marring his otherwise blandly pleasant expression. “Over with?”

Gwen tugged at her restraints, ducking her head so he couldn’t see her embarrassment. “If you’re going to do it, do it,” she snapped, feeling distinctly like a mouse being toyed with. It wasn’t something she was used to associating with David, but then again this was an evening of new things.

And what was Halloween for, except to come as you  _aren’t_?

“‘Do it’?” There was a raspy edge to his voice, one that she knew meant he was close to breaking. “D-do my worst, you mean?”

“I hate you,” she said, mostly because it was the only non-profanity-ridden thing she could think of to say.

As David settled in behind her again, he leaned over her and murmured, “How do you feel? Are the restraints okay?”

Her heart squeezed. “Fine,” she replied, wriggling her shoulders to stretch her back and keeping her voice as low as his was, as though they could hide from the roleplay by whispering. “But if you’re gonna take more than ten minutes, I might need to change positions.”

“Don’t worry.” Gwen felt his fingers along the sides of her entrance, then the familiar blunt pressure of his head. “That…won’t be a problem.”

Sex between them had become familiar. Not boring – she was literally tied down; there were definitely words for that but none of them were “ _boring_ ” – but there was a bizarre comfort in the way her body stretched and shifted to accommodate him, a bone-deep rightness that turned her muscles to jelly. She slumped forward with a soft “hh- _ahh_ ,” arching her back in a catlike stretch to push herself more fully onto his dick and enjoying his sharp inhale. It occurred to her that she was enjoying this a bit too much for a princess, and a slightly evil idea popped into her head.

And, well, Gwen was never really one for impulse control.

As David pushed forward again she let out a squeaky yelp, something that passably resembled pain. He went still immediately. “Gwen?” he asked, a little too fast, and she didn’t need to be able to see him to know that he was frantically running through the past few minutes to calculate whether she hadn’t been prepared enough, if he should’ve gotten some lube for good measure … “What should I do?”

“Don’t move,” she gasped, wriggling a bit under him and biting back a sadistic grin at the way his breathing stuttered. “You’re …” – a thousand bad fanfics ran through her head at lightning speed, dozens of variations on “tearing in half” imagery considered and rejected in a second’s time – “hurting me!” Before he could panic and start apologizing like the very-not-pirate he was, she added, “It – feels so big!”  

(Which wasn’t  _strictly_  true; there were a lot of wonderful ways to describe his cock, but “large” wasn’t one of them. It was slender, shorter than average, a beautiful flushed red and almost-tan with this curve like a perfect sex toy … but fuck it, sometimes she had to indulge a little in classic porno sleaziness, and a little flattery never hurt.)

It worked. His voice was less alarmed as he said, “Wh-what?”

“Is it supposed to be like this the first time?”

“The first? What –” He cut off abruptly. “Y-you’re saying you’ve never –”

Trying to keep the glee out of her voice, she said, “Of course! I’m not a … harlot, you know.”

“Oh.” She felt him twitch inside her. “Um. Wow.”

“I was saving myself,” she added unnecessarily, because this was just too damn fun. “For … uh, marriage.”

“Oh.” There was a note of melancholy in his voice, and Gwen began to panic – was that too angsty? Was she bringing up some weird repressed religious thing he’d never told her about? – but before she could put together the words to ask she felt him shift his weight, leaning over her to press a kiss where her sleeve had slipped off her shoulder. “For what it’s worth,” he murmured, pausing to snag her earlobe between his teeth and making her shiver, “I think you’ll make a wonderful pirate.”

That took a minute to process, especially when she could still feel him pulsing distractingly against the walls of her cunt. “Are you … proposing to me?”

“Nope! I don’t like rejection – you might’ve noticed,” he teased, reaching forward to run his hands along the ropes binding her hands to the headboard. “But the option’s there. If you want it.”

Fuck, who’d given him permission to be good at this? He had to be reading much more of her smut than he let on. “Maybe if you can convince me,” she replied, squirming just enough to remind him of what they were in the middle of. “Your type is supposed to be good at this kind of thing, aren’t they?”

David hummed thoughtfully, drawing back until he was almost completely out of her. “Not bad! Or so I’ve been told.”

(Sure he had. By  _her_.) “Just – start out slow,” she said, gasping as he began to move. “Try not to hurt me.”

Maybe there’d been a bit too much vulnerability in her voice, because he paused, taking a moment to stroke her cheek with the knuckles of his right hand. “Of course, my princess,” he murmured, running the pad of his thumb over her bottom lip. “Whatever you need.”

 _Fuck_. She wasn’t allowed to talk like that, not in this role, but she dropped her forehead onto her bound hands with a groan, because that was unfairly fucking suave and he felt unfairly fucking amazing and  _fuck_  he wasn’t even trying anymore, she didn’t think, it was just fucking instinct for him to angle his hips to hit every fucking sensitive spot she had and fuck fuck fuck fuck  _fuck_.

She managed to hold out for a few minutes before cracking, saying “You can go a bit faster, it’s okay” in a tone that was a lot less shy-virgin-being-debauched-for-the-first-time than she’d intended, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

“Th-th _a-hh_ ank you.” His breathing roughened, fingers digging into her hips, and his movements became at once more forceful and less controlled, juddering and uneven. Usually he waited a little longer to speed up like that; despite the cool smugness he was (annoyingly) good at portraying, David was clearly much more worked up than she’d thought. “ _God_ ,” he choked out, and she felt the comforting weight of his forehead pressed between her shoulders as his hips snapped forward.

Her hands twitched inside their bonds, dying to reach between her legs. She couldn’t even press her thighs together to get the slightest pressure on her clit. “ _Please_. Please touch me.”

David lifted his head, shifting his weight to balance on one hand and the fingers of his other fumbling beneath her skirts. He wobbled – a sudden heaviness on her, removed as his hand pulled away from the cloud of tangled fabric – and then steadied himself again. “No,” he finally gasped, making no effort to try again. “Just – not yet. Close.”

He never said no to her. Usually not during sex,  _certainly_  not when she begged.

Gwen dropped her head onto her bound wrists and muttered, “Ff _fuck._ ” (Sure, it wasn’t ladylike, but with her cunt heavy and throbbing along with her heartbeat she didn’t really care. Besides, judging by the increasing irregularity of David’s thrusts and the soft ragged whines half-stifled with every breath, he was getting close, and if hearing her talk dirty would get him there faster …) “Please, Captain –  _sir_  – I’ll do whatever you want, but you feel so good and I need you …” She trailed off with a moan that was slightly exaggerated but not fake.

“Oh jeez,” he mumbled into her hair, the clumped locks that straggled down the back of her neck and over her shoulders. “Oh god,  _nnghhod_  Gwen I – ffhha –”

He curled over her, dragging searing lines down her sides with his fingernails as he went silent, trembling around her and inside her in uneven rhythm. She rocked her hips back slightly, easing him down and enjoying the way each movement drew a shudder from him, violent at first but slowly relaxing until he was finished. He pulled out of her slowly, planting kisses down her spine as he moved away, and slipped off the edge of the bed.

“Sorry about that,” he said, untying her ankles and then moving around on shaky legs to her wrists. He was avoiding her gaze, and she wondered if he was more embarrassed that he couldn’t make her come before he did, or ashamed that he’d refused to. “Can I say it’s because I’m a pirate?”

She let him gently roll her onto her back and refasten her ankles to the foot of the bed; while her wrists were no longer attached to the headboard they were still tied together, resting just under her breastbone like she was praying. “I dunno,” she replied, drawing it out teasingly. “Are pirates usually that selfish?”

He flinched, but before she could worry his eyes flicked up to hers, a sheepish grin twitching the corner of his mouth. “How else would they get all that gold?”

“Quick fingers,” she said with a laugh, wriggling both to test the ropes around her ankles and to remind him that they were still very  _not_  done, “that you better start using, Captain.” Her dress brushed against her outer thigh, the tuile rough on the raw scratches there and making her suck in a pained hiss. “Maybe a little less nail this time.”

“Oh!” He lifted the fabric away, and she twisted to see the welt-like marks shining red and angry like cat scratches. “Oh my gosh, Gwen, I’m so sorry! I should’ve cut my nails but I – I just wasn’t thinking. Here, let me get you some –”

“No no nonono! This first, Greenwood.” She arched as well as she could, given her restraints. “I’ll be fine.”

David looked hesitant, but she gave him her best annoyed look and he took at seat at the foot of the bed, settling between her legs. He inspected his hands again, drawing his knuckles in toward his palm like he was going to blow on his fingertips. “Maybe if I just go clip –”

“Nuh-uh.” If she could have snapped her legs shut around him, she would’ve. Then again, as his gaze drifted lower and his tongue darted out to lick his lips, maybe it was better for her case that she was held down like this. “Seriously, David, I don’t care, just do it already.”

He paused, then nodded with a determined expression on his face that Gwen knew meant trouble. Before she could comment on it he cupped his hands around her calves, lowering his head between her legs. She couldn’t see beyond the ridiculous volume of her skirt, but the warm wet glide of his tongue was unmistakable.

“Whoa, hey, what the fuck?!” She tried unsuccessfully to squirm away from his mouth. “That’s – you  _just_  – don’t …”

He pulled back just enough to kiss her inner thigh, making her shiver despite her guilt. “It’s nothing!” he said, then dropped his voice slyly. “A good pirate’s had much worse things in his mouth.”

She laughed breathlessly, letting her head fall back against the pillow as he traced her folds with his tongue. “You dork.” David hummed in reply, the sound vibrating pleasantly. Trying to muddle through the unpleasant self-consciousness prickling at the corners of her brain, she struggled for a joke. “I mean … probably not the saltiest thing though, huh?”

She could tell it took him a moment to understand, in the way he froze before lifting his head. “That’s not very a princess-like thing to say,” he said, his voice rough with the sound of him clearly trying not to laugh. “You shouldn’t – shouldn’t even know what that implies!”

“Oh shit, you’re right.” Gwen inhaled deeply to inject as much breathiness and high pitch into her tone as possible. “ _Goodness_ , Captain, I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re doing, but it certainly f –” He closed his lips around her clit, sucking lightly, and her train of thought derailed for a moment. “F-eels nice.”

He didn’t respond, devoting himself fully to his task, and years of practice had made him an expert at it. She’d always thought she hated unpredictability (every guy thought he just had to keep changing things up to keep it interesting) but David understood her intimately enough to know exactly what worked; while he would shift back and forth on a dime – feather-light flicks with the tip of his tongue back and forth, then almost-too-slow, wide circles, then pulling his tongue back and using the rest of his mouth – it was exciting instead of frustrating, kept her from getting overly sensitive or sore and  _damn_  it she really wasn’t allowed to swear, was she?

“ _God,_  yeah that’s –” Her toes curled, feet flexing with the urge to lift her hips closer to his face (which she couldn’t do, tied up like this); her hands twitched without being able to bury her fingers in his hair. “Fuck,  _fuck_  –”

It hit her like a strained rubber band snapping, almost not as much pleasure as earth-shaking relief, making her arch her spine and toss her head back. (Distantly she registered a sigh against her cunt, a near-silent “ _wow_ ” that didn’t mean anything in the moment.) He worked her through it, through three little waves of shivery aftershocks until she nudged his cheek with her inner thigh. Then he sat up, stroking her leg with a painfully soft smile as she caught her breath.  _He loves you,_ she thought. It was hardly a new realization, but it struck her like a brick to the chest every time.  _This is real_.

“So.” His voice was as bright as ever, though the look on his face was just on the wrong side of smug. “How was it?”

“I … forgot to think of England.”

It took him a moment to get it, but then he chuckled, his face lighting up with a warm candlelight glow. “Well, practice makes perfect,” he replied brightly. “Would you like to try again?”

Her eyes widened in what she hoped was a convincing expression of surprise. “ _Can_  I? So soon?”

“Let’s find out!”


End file.
